The Day I Died
by dawneh
Summary: Some strange JP musings
1. Chapter 1

My name is John Paul McQueen and three days ago I died.

Death can come to us in so many ways. There are the lucky ones get to slip away peacefully after a long and happy life, and then there are those who fight to hold on to every breath until the last of their strength is finally taken from them and they have nothing left to fight with.

Me? My death was neither of those things. It was sudden and unexpected. But maybe I should go back a few days before it happened and let you know who I was and what a life I once had.

Last week I was happy. Happier than I had ever thought I could be. I had had to struggle hard for that happiness but when I won it I knew it had been worth all the pain, all the lies and all the deceit.

You see a year ago I fell in love. Normally that would have been a joyous thing in itself. Falling in love is surely always something to celebrate, to cherish, but my love wasn't quite that simple.

My love came with some terrible complications.

Firstly I had fallen in love with my best friend.

Secondly I had to finally admit to the world, and to myself, that I was gay.

Thirdly, and this was the real hard part, I had to accept that this wonderful man I had fallen for would never see me as anything more than a friend. He was straight. He had a beautiful girlfriend. There was never any chance he would love me the way that I loved him and I had to learn to live with that. I had no choice.

Of course life has a funny way of messing with your head and just when I was moving on and putting my feelings for him away (or at least trying to) everything changed. He said loved me. He said wanted me. And when he kissed me I knew that I would never love anyone the way that I loved him.

So you see I had everything I ever wanted. Right there, wrapped up in a snowflake patterned cardigan was the only man I have ever loved and every time he touched me I felt complete.

But with that love came all the complications. You remember the pain and lies and deceit I mentioned? Well that's what loving him brought me for the longest time. Our love made me into a liar. I lied to our friends, my family, the man I was seeing, I lied to everyone and anyone as long as it meant I got to hold him and kiss him and make love to him.

For a while I even thought that it would be enough. That having him just sometimes would be enough. Of course it wasn't. Every time I saw him with his girlfriend it nearly killed me. I wanted to scream out to the world that he was mine, all mine, but how could I when he would look at me with those eyes and plead for a little more time. It was always a little more time. He would tell her tomorrow. How could I have forgotten that tomorrow is a day that never arrives?

In the end loving him made me cruel. I exposed our love in the cruellest way I could have imagined. I didn't plan it but after I had done it, after I had exposed what we had, I couldn't regret it. I had had enough of living a lie and I think in the end so had he.

I'm sure, for a while, he hated me for what I did, for the way I let his girlfriend know he wanted me more than her by letting her walk in on us. But I'm also sure he was grateful for what I did. Grateful that I ended the lies he seemed unable to so that we could finally be together. And we were.

Which brings me back to last week when I was happy.

I had the man of my dreams in my life and everybody knew. I wouldn't say everybody was happy for us, far from it, but they knew and we didn't have to hide anymore.

My name is John Paul McQueen and three days ago I died and I'd only just discovered what living really felt like.

I finally knew how it felt to be in love and to be loved and it was never, ever going to end.

We had our future all planned out and it was to begin in Dublin. His dream had always been to go to University there. My dream was to be with him so where else would I want to be but in Dublin by his side?

We were both packed and ready to go. I was so excited, more excited than I had ever been in my life because of him. He was my everything and I was his and nothing was ever going to spoil that. That's what I thought.

And then there came that life thing again, letting me believe that I had everything that I wanted and then showing me that maybe I didn't after all.

It sounds silly when you say it out loud. It seems inconceivable that anyone would walk away from what we had over something so simple. But that's exactly what I did.

Standing with him at the airport, waiting to start our new lives together, was when I asked him to do it, and when I realised that he couldn't. It wasn't that he didn't want to, or that he didn't love me, it was much deeper than that, much darker, much worse.

Standing, surrounded by people we didn't know and would never see again the man I loved couldn't kiss me. Not wouldn't. COULDN'T.

And that was when I knew I couldn't go with him.

I couldn't go back to being his secret again. I couldn't take that look of shame or embarrassment in his eyes if I tried to touch him. I couldn't live a lie again, not even for the man I loved. Not wouldn't. COULDN'T.

Three days ago I was standing at an airport with the man I loved and I turned and walked away.

That was the day my heart stopped beating, the day that I died.

My name is John Paul McQueen and three days ago I died. Now I just have to learn how to live again.


	2. Chapter 2

My name is Craig Dean and three days ago my life ended.

I always thought that would happen when I was old and frail. I thought that my life would be long and filled with happiness and that death wouldn't claim me until I was a very tired old man. But I'm still young, there was still so much life left to experience and yet life has now abandoned me.

There have been few times in my life when I felt truly happy, when I didn't worry that something bad would come along to ruin what I had, but I thought, for a while, I had finally found that one happiness that would last.

When I was young I thought my family was a happy one. The house was always filled with laughter and singing, until the day my dad left. That's when the laughter stopped, that's when I knew that no matter how good things were something was always waiting around the corner to take it from you.

When I met Sarah I thought that I'd discovered what love was. She was everything I had ever dreamed of. Bright, sexy, funny, I felt so proud to be walking down the street with her on my arm, I didn't think anything else could ever feel that good. I was wrong about that too!

One blonde haired blue-eyed boy changed everything, completely.

Now let me get one thing straight (no pun intended) I'm not gay you see. I've never fancied another bloke. Never imagined touching one, or kissing one, or making love to one. I'd never wondered how it would feel to have a man like him holding me, entering me, claiming me. It's not anything I'd ever thought about or anything I'd ever wanted.

But it's still something I did.

I'd known how he felt about me for ages. I'd hurt him for it and I'd hated him for it, but eventually I couldn't stop myself from loving him for it.

The first time I touched him, really touched him, I was terrified. It should have felt wrong, it should have disgusted me and appalled me but it didn't. It felt like the most perfect thing in the world and even then, even after how I acted, I knew it wouldn't stop. I knew I wouldn't stop.

It's funny what you think you can get away with in the name of love. The lies, the hurt and the betrayal. As long as I wrapped my actions within the words "it's because I love him" I would feel justified in what I did, to him, to her and even to myself.

Sarah had never deserved the way I treated her. Sneaking away at every opportunity just so that I could be with him. But then he never deserved it either, having to watch me be with her, having to listen to me promise that I would tell her only to change my mind at the last second. But it was alright, I was only doing it because I loved him. See how that works? I was doing it out of love so it was allowed!

In the end of course something had to give, something had to break. I always thought it would be me. That I wouldn't be able to hold in what I was doing, that the need and confusion in me would explode. I never expected it to be him. I never expected what he did or how he did it. I never expected how much I would hate him for exposing me for the cheat and the liar I was. And I never expected how much I would love him for freeing me from the lies and letting me be myself at last.

My name is Craig Dean and three days ago my life ended when, in reality, it felt as if my life had only just begun.

The freedom felt wonderful for a while. I was liberated and exhilarated and I knew that everything would be alright from that moment on. When I finally had the strength to stand in front of my family and tell them that I loved him I thought the hardest part was over.

I didn't realise that the hardest part was only just beginning. I didn't know that I would suddenly feel every pair of eyes constantly watching me and judging me. I could hear people calling me names, even in the silence, even when I was alone.

Getting away from them all seemed the perfect answer and, when I asked him to come to Dublin with me, the bright love shining in his eyes told me that it was the right choice. It was going to be me and him together and nothing would ever be able to come between us.

Except that I'd forgotten that no matter how good things are, something is always waiting around the corner to take it from you.

When I think about it now it seems ridiculous, but at that moment in time he might as well have asked me to climb Everest. He asked me to do one simple thing and I couldn't. I really couldn't. And I tried so hard. Every fibre of my being was calling out to him, wanting to take hold of him right there in front of all those watching, judging eyes but I couldn't.

All he had wanted was for me to kiss him. Like I had done a thousand times before. But I couldn't. Not wouldn't. COULDN'T.

I loved him, love him, but I couldn't be the man that he ultimately wanted and needed, the man that he deserved. I tried to tell him that things would be different in Dublin but we both knew that it was just words, just more empty promises falling from Craig Dean's mouth.

Watching him walk away was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life but even then I couldn't do the one thing that would have made him stay.

And I realised that he couldn't live that life again, he couldn't face going back to the place we had fought so hard to escape from. Not wouldn't. COULDN'T.

Three days ago I was standing at an airport with the man I loved and I had to watch as he walked away.

That was the day my heart stopped beating, the day my life ended.

My name is Craig Dean and three days ago my life ended. Now I just have to find something worth living for again.


End file.
